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Detroit and the Politics of Rock
"The alternative culture in the Detroit/Ann Arbor community is first and foremost a rock and roll culture,' says Dave Marsh, editor of Creem Magazine. "It is around the music that the community has grown, and it is the music which holds it together."
Detroit is a city where the major concern is the automobile industry. Like the mills in Liverpool, England, or the mines in Newcastle in that same country, industry presented itself as the sole career possibility for many young men when they finished school. And just like the Beatles, or Eric Burdon and the Animals who in farway England didn't want to work like their dads did everyday from nine to five all their lives, the youths in the Midwest sought an alternative. With its flash and energy, rock and roll music provided that alternative.
In a way it's not surprising; if you look at what the virtues of rock have been-spontaneity, internal combustion, and a don't give a damn attitude — you can see that the conditions under which the form originally grew to life in the early fifties were much the same as existed in Detroit in around 1966. There was largely a sterile environment, a tremendous amount of kids who weren't being motivated to do anything in particular. 'I looked at all those factories," said Dave Marsh, "and I said not me! Never.' Other cities have had a collection of cultural currents to distract them and push them in certain directions, Detroit had practically nothing. There was little but the television culture to distract the minds of the inhabitants.
Of course there always was Motown; in Detroit, a perfect example of the assembly line consciousness — turning hit out after hit. But for the majority of white kids, it became the MC5, the Stooges, the Rationals, UP, Amboy Dukes, SRC, Frut, Pride of Women, and Detroit. It was killer rock and roll. High energy music. Right on and ace dude.
Set against the predominant culture, the rock and roll that came out of Detroit was acting as a total reversal. Where Detroit was bland, its music was vibrant and exciting, where Detroit tried to smooth over interior violence, its rock was consciously and defiantly brutal, where in Detroit tried to emphasize middle class virtues and restraint, its rock promoted running wild in the streets, and anything else that had been declared taboo. However, since Detroit was not an intellectually inclined city, Detroiters shied away from using any ideas of technical excellence, or elaborate musical forms. Their music was primitive, based on vibrations rather than actual arrangements of notes. There was no art-rock here, no raga-rock, no jazz rock.
A major figure in the Detroit/Ann Arbor rock and roll community was John Sinclair (currently serving a ten year term in prison for possession of marijuana). Sinclair had been on the Detroit scene for many years, sort of a father figure to the counterculture, and although he never actually played in any of the bands himself, he was the first one to pick up on the power that rock and roll represented for the city. Of course the black music from Motown and even Mitch Ryder backed by the Detroit Wheels had demonstrated that music could be a revolutionary force. But Sinclair took it all a step further with a struggling young band known as the MC5 (Motor City 5), and laid the foundations for what would be a powerful music scene.
Around 1967 and for a few years afterwards, there wasn't anyone in Detroit who wouldn't tell you that the MC5 were the best band in the world. In addition to their killer, high energy music, they would get out on stage all flash, wearing incredible clothing, and put on a show. Get out there and knock-em dead was their motto, and almost single handedly they resurrected the stage show in a time when it was mostly fashionable for rock musicians to stand on stage looking stoned and not moving much except their fingers on the guitar strings. The MC5 would move, they would get out there and do splits, and if they had to they would jump into the audience. Get down, and raise some sweat. Smash guitars and amplifiers and anything else in sight. The kids in Detroit loved it and screamed for more. The MC5 talked the words of revolution, but more importantly, they came up with a music that was consistently revolutionary. Music that conveyed all forms of power.
Not only were they moving at a high speed, so was the rest of Detroit. The MC5 weren't the only group to come to prominence during Detroit's golden era. The Stooges (formerly the Psychedelic Stooges) also joined them in 1968 and usually managed to go one better on stage. Led by squirming demon Iggy Stooge, they created an incredibly theatrical act dominated by the rule that if they couldn't make the audience come to them, they would have to go to the audience. When the Stooges take the stage no one is quite sure of what will happen. Iggy becomes the audience; leaping into the crowd, rubbing peanut butter all over his body, performing covered only in jeans and silver glitter with frosted white hair, or, like at a recent rock festival, he will dance all over the audience's outstretched hands. "I am the audience," Iggy has said. "I'm convinced that whatever I want is the same thing that the audience wants." The Stooges act has gone further and further out, and so has the music. There is a constant feedback, almost deafening sound, with melodic guitar lines occasionally overlapping, all of it backed by a steady, monotonous drumbeat. Where the MC5 wanted to be the archetypical rock and roll band, the Stooges seemed to reject such a role; they never set themselves up for dancing and jumping around in a happy good time mood; watching the Stooges is like watching some sort of private psychodrama. They picked up on the boredom, the frustration, the mixture of self-hate and pride that was so much a part of being a teenager in the sixties.
There were many other bands to blossom in Detroit around the late 1960's, many of them have since broken up. The Amboy Dukes, led by the fantastic guitar talent of Ted Nugent; the Nationals, one of the first bands t0 have a hit record; SRC, one of the first groups to come out of Detroit and get a major recording contract (now re-formed as Blue Scepter.)
And then, strangely enough, the most successful band to come out of Detroit commercially was Grand Funk Railroad. Because Terry Knight consciously did not want the band to be merely a local band, and instead opted for huge national success, he kept them out of Detroit for a long time. They were not a "community' band, and their politics were frowned upon. Earlier, the MC5 had made an attempt to become stars on the national scene, and many feel that it was that desire for the star trip that caused their music to become less righteous.
Alice Cooper lives in the Detroit area, and feels that there is more love of third generation rock and roll music there than anywhere else in the country. The stage show that Alice does is just a visual extension of the high energy music they play. Their act includes bits with a live boa constrictor, an electric chair, and again — feedback! Theater, outrageous and completely alive.
The UP is the band of the White Panther party, closely associated with Sinclair and the current attempts to get him out of jail. They have played many benefits in the Detroit area, and seem very determined to keep their close ties to the community. They also have taken steps towards distributing their own product; their first single "Just Like An Aborigine" was released by them on their own Sundance label. They pressed the copies themselves and were in control of the distribution.
The Frut is one of the newer, more outrageous bands to come out of Detroit. They are truly a bunch of street people, most of whom never played instruments before, and one day went into a small "party" record label and recorded their LP, 'Keep On Truckin'. It's full of songs like "Take Your Clothes Off I Love You", end "Running Bear and Little White Dove". During some of their concerts they shoot bows and arrows into the audience, as well as Ripple wine....
One of the more interesting bands currently playing in Detroit is Pride of Women, the first funky all-woman band. They have not made issues of women's liberation in relation to their music, just the fact that they are on stage and playing killer rock and roll says it all.
And the music keeps coming out of Detroit. The Flamin Groovies, from San Francisco, like to play best in Detroit. "It's where the energy's at, man," says lead guitarist Cyril Jordan. Mitch Ryder recently formed his new band, Detroit, and they are of course extremely popular in that area.
Today, Detroit is going through changes that would naturally seem to follow shakeups in self-images. In the late 1960's many people forgot in Detroit that what was true for them was not necessarily the same for the rest of the country... sort of Detroit chauvinism. Many hassles occurred, problems with record companies, problems with politics (Sinclair's going to jail had an incredibly demoralizing effect on the entire community), ballrooms closing and then re-opening and then closing again. Detroit has had its share of troubles with rock and roll.
But the music still keeps coming out of there, more alive now than ever. In a time when Time Magazine and the media have decided that "rock is dead" and the new music is "soft", Detroit is still thumbing their noses at all that. The music from the Midwest reassures all of those who love loud, noisy rock and roll, outrageous theatrics and the defying of established traditions. "Our music is simple," says Iggy Stooge, "it's so simple that you can't miss it."